30 Fast Life SEO Tactics/Techniques for 2010

30 Fast Life SEO Tactics/Techniques for 2010

We all love the fast life of the SEO industry, don’t we? Each day is a challenge and the sheer diversity of tasks makes this profession so refreshing. As we have to deal with a plethora of developments, hundreds of ranking factors and daily breaking news which can make or brake a business we’re also short on time all the time.

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We’d like to do so much more during a day or the business hours but we can’t.

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Sometimes it seems that the actual time we have to perform SEO tasks is the shortest in between all the Web buzz. This will be most probably truer than ever in 2010. On such days it’s best to remind yourself that there are at least 30 fast life SEO tactics/techniques for 2010 you can sometimes make use of in minutes or a few hours.

So I’m not talking about long term strategies here. I’m not even mentioning great ways of getting links like widget bait that take time and planning and a team to make them happen.

Here I want to list SEO tactics you can use while living the fast life of the SEO industry.

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Blogging

Do you doubt that blogging is probably the number SEO technique these days? Yes, it’s both tactic and strategy. It works both as a long term endeavor to gain trust and authority and as a quick way to get links, traffic and overall attention. There are several ways to use SEO to gain traction fast. For some of them you don’t even need a blog yourself.

blog commenting – No bot-like “great post, thank you” crap. write blog comments that makes sense, even short ones, Nick of Brick Marketing is my favorite blog commenter when it comes to it. Always 100% and on point he manages to add value even contributing just a one liner.

making interviews – interview others or get interviewed. In case you’re too new to get interviewed ask others questions and they’ll be glad to answer them unless they’re too successful and busy already

featuring other bloggers – write about, describe, list them. In order to forge lasting relationships within your niche you should support your niche bloggers anyways. What better way is there than to make the first step and write about them?

microblogging – Set up microblog like Tumblr, Soup, Posterous etc. and start posting links instead of only on Delicious ond Twitter

Social Media

Social media is the main stream now. Do you know many sites that are not social in some way? At least by added buttons o social sites? By now social is the norm so everything SEO is social as well as SEO deals with a social Web not a static one.

In 2010 these social sites have even more influence on search both directly and as ranking factors. You’ll see results from Twitter on “hot” topics and you’ll see popular stuff ranking better then ever as the search engines move to include the tweet and other votes as a link equivalent.

answering questions on Twitter – people tweet questions related to your buiness or industry all time, some even mention your brand. Reply. Help them. Some will be very grateful. they will remember you or link you instantly. They will want to make business with you or hire you. Not all of them ut there are enough of such people.

answering questions on Yahoo Answers – people ask the most basic questions on YA and other Q&A sites. In case you know just a little bit you appear already as an expert. You get recurring traffic from YA right to your doorstep.

vote begging (via Twitter, Skype) – There is no shame in it. Do it right though. Don’t ask all the time and don’t ask the same people over and over.

expanding LinkedIn network – only approch people who know you at least virtually. Otherwise offer a really good explanation why you want to connect.

republishing – Use services like Ping.fm for “multichannel” publishing of your online assets. Also see “microblogging” above.

Content Creation

Content creation always has been a big part of clean SEO. No content – nothing to get indexed. In 2010 when everybody, even the last of the big players align their content creation strategy with Google. So how do you want to compete with them?

How do you want to stand out from the vere growing crowd? How can you achieve all of the above fast? Some ways come as no surprise here but still work (lists) or rather better than ever (case studies, tutorials).

compiling lists – compiling a list is the classic form of providing useful resources online. People scan don’t read on the Web so list will always be popular even though the Internet is a little oversaturated with them as of now.

making case studies – every business can create case studies, unless the business just started. Make case studies more than just ad copy. Provide useful clues for the general public and industry insiders alike.

writing how tos/tutorials – along list, how to articles and tutorials are the most common pillar content types. Things that seem completely self-evident to you are hard to grasp for others. So provide them with written assistance. Even something like “how to perform a Google search” might be very useful to plenty of readers.

publishing other media – sometimes an image says more than 1000 words. You can even make an image of text and will spread virally via microblogs, image bookmarking sites and other social media channels

creating overviews – other than big lists overviews do not aim to overwhelm with information, they make huge chunks of information digestible for the casual visitor. For instance an overview of the newly available Android smartphones is hell of a helpful thing these days but there are numerous other topics only a few people can overview without someone who creates an catual overview in a simple table or infographic.

Real Time Search

Google has introduced real time search results from several sources but mainly Twitter to enhance regular search results. You may notice a scrollable section on the Google results page. That’s it. Also Google News results appear there among others. So it’s a old and new search features combined.

scheduling tweets – Currently the real time Twitter results integration is somewhat simplistic. In most cases the last tweets containing a keyword get included. So to make sure to appear on top you have to repeat your tweets from time to time. there are plenty of tools that allow you to schedule recurring tweets or simply to “tweet later”. I don’t advise you to completely automate that process though. Make sure not to scare away your followers.

integrating twitter into your blog. I’ve tested numerous ways of Twitter integration into blogs and most of them don’t work as desired. Right now I recommend adding a Twitter retweet button. Topsy is my favorite currently but has its flaws.

using hashtags – add #hashtags to your tweets. Not all tweets about SEO contain the term SEO. The easist way to make people interested in the topic will see it is to add a so called hashtag like “#seo” (without quotes).

using Google Hot Trends – Watch Google Hot Trends and tweet/write on topics people actually care about at a given moment in time. It’s in a way a real time keyword research tool. I’m not referring to the “Tiger Woods Guide to SEO”. Pick topics that fit your publication.

publishing press releases – press releases aren’t dead. They show up in Google News and thus in real time search for “hot” topics.

Personalized Search

In late 2009 personalized search results have been introduced to every Google searcher unless s/he opts out. That means search reulst get personal by default and most people won’t even know. URLs they click more often than others will be ranked on top. Some people argue that the difference won’t be as big but you surely don’t want to find out the hard way. Instead, try to optimize for personalized search from now on.

making people click your search results – there are plenty of ways to make people click on your search snippet in search results, the best one is to show those who like you already a SERP where you actually rank on top. I use gog.is/seo+2.0 for that task.

asking for clicks – this is no joke, you have to ask your followers, fans, friends, employees and partners to actually click on search results where yo rank well

encouraging use of SearchWiki – The Google SearchWiki still exists and allows you to personlaize your search results actively. Those voted up rank on top of all others! Make people push those buttons by offering a prize for th best SearchWiki comment.

make friends – this is still the best way to get people to return. Make friends on social media and offer other incentives to trust you.the best way to say “I ant to be your friend” is by giving a gift. A link is the best gift in SEO circles.

Page Speed

While real time search and personalized search get most of the buzz the introduction of page speed as ranking factor is big news that deserves more attention. In a way now the fast life of the SEO industry has become literally faster. How to optimize for speed so that you also rank better?

removing Flash and huge images – Face it: Images and Flash (Video!) are still the biggest obstacles when it comes to load time. Even on fast Internet connections need a while for those.

Google Caffeine

These days the new Google index dubbed Caffeine will appear in search results. It has been rumored to be one of the biggest changes in years but nobody can really tell what changes might occur.

Those who suggest some actual changes only talk about minor ones and to keep going with a sound content creation and SEO strategy. So instead of optimizing for Google Caffeine just try drinking some coffee to spice up your blog postings and other content. These suggestions might be a little humorous.

drinking less coffee – Google will bring enough caffeine in the search engine so you should curb your consumption in order not to get penalized

buying only organic and fair trade coffee – Buying non-organic non-organic coffee will be considered black hat so make sure you don’t exploit humans or algos

relying solely on caffeine – dump toxic energy drinks that make you dizzy and your bowels hurt. Caffeine is the only natural enhancement of human energy levels and search engine results

tweeting under the influence – tweet while drinking coffee. The caffeine will make your tweets livelier and better digestible. Your followers and Google will love it.

consuming caffeine without the coffee – in case you don’t drink coffee you don’t have to. there are plenty of non-alcoholic drinks containing lots of it. Cola is probably the most known but I don’t recommend. It’s very bad for your teeth among other issues.

I hope you can make use of some of these 30 fast life SEO tactics/techniques for 2010. I know that the list format doesn’t allow really deep insights. So in case you have questions on some of the tactics/techniques feel free to ask. I may elaborate on them in a new post on SEOptimise or my own blog.

Edit: Sorry for the bad layout but it seems that WordPress 2.9 is eating all the line breaks.